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Abstract
This grouping of chapters dealt largely with how MI and differentiation can be used in other ways besides the lesson plan in the classroom as well as how to deal with students as individuals. MI is important to apply to every facet of the classroom. It can be used to get the classroom under control, to understand why students are acting out, as well as assessing and grading students. Tess said in her abstract “ Different classroom management strategies incorporating all the MI’s would be more effective, different students would respond differently to each technique.” Basically, in order to manage your classroom in the most efficient and effective manner you have to use strategies that appeal to all students equally. For instance, a musical cue to calm students down, or simply writing on the board. Furthermore, the books talk about how using MI in Spec. Education classrooms could be greatly useful. All students learn in different ways and can benefit from being taught in a way that caters to them, ALL students. Also, the book suggests that when grading individual students to focus more on summative assessments not formative assessments. Allison hit the nail on the head “The problem with grading these in the differentiated classroom is that all students learn at different speeds, and grading them all the same way is not going to make for student success. It's much better at the these early points to look for progress instead of mastery.” The important thing in the classroom, the book stresses, is to look for progress among students rather than complete understanding of the subject early on.
Synthesis
Unsurprisingly, one commonality was present among all of our comments – grading. We all had strong opinions about the grading policies and practices mentioned in these four chapters. Although we all recognized the need for a differentiated classroom to have a grading system that reflected student achievement in a fuller way, we had different ideas on what that might look like. Most agreed that individual progress and effort should be acknowledged alongside the grade that indicated the student’s level of mastery. However, some preferred a single grade that encompassed all of these elements, as opposed to separate grades for each criterion.
Another prominent theme related to the benefits of MI theory when working with students with disabilities. Most of us saw MI theory as a great way to create truly inclusive classrooms. MI theory is an educational philosophy centered on utilizing student strengths, focusing on abilities, rather than deficits, as a means to engage, teach and assess students. It seemed to all of us, that MI theory is an ideal lens with which to view, and support, all students, including those students with disabilities.
MI theory also had implications for classroom management. The suggestions provided in the chapter really caught our collective eye, and provided us with useful tips on how to create desired behaviors and to manage transitions. In particular, several people commented on the preventative and reactive measures, such as the use of MI related hooks, communication of the classroom expectations, and attention grabbing instructional strategies.
Sean Falasca
Grading can be assigning symbolic letters or numbers at the end of a specified time to evaluate a student’s performance, or reporting evaluations to students and parents. The important part about grading is to give high quality feedback to the importance audiences like students, parents, or guardians. A grade should represent proficiency related to important goals. This is why goals and standards should be made very clearly to students so that they can receive a proper evaluation of their understandings. Grades should not be influenced by outside factors like putting names on their paper or the quality of their penmanship because neither of those shows mastery or understanding. The worst student in the world can put their name on their paper a nd write excellently, but that won’t help them in the real world that much. A grade should represent that students full capabilities. Don’t limit them based off solely one or two pieces of criteria. There are students who can be misplaced in a class full of high performers when they are a low performer or vice versa. Normal letter grading tends to promote an unhealthy competition and discourage those with low grades. People in my high school actually made cliques out of who got what type of grades. The sort of “winners” and “losers” of the school based off grades is not acceptable. It’s not fair because there are students who have lower grades just because they are bored, aren’t being challenged enough, or not being taught the right way. Working out of a J Curve where all students have the same opportunity to earn high grades based on achievement of clearly stated goals. Grades should be established based on summative assessment that is properly designed to allow students gathered proficiency related to identify goals. One of the worst things in school is when teachers have different opinions about grading. You have to memorize each teacher’s preferences on what constitutes a good grade. For all teachers to make it easier on students understanding of how to succeed, they should uniformly apply the asp ect of grading. Grade students for achievement of goals, progress toward goals, and work habits. Managing a class when using MI can be approached a variety of ways. To gain attention you can write silence please on the whiteboard, clap a short rhythmic phrase, put your fingers against your lips, provide a picture of what an attentive class looks like, use a stopwatch to keep track of time wasted, whisper to a students that its time to start and pass it along, simply start teaching and let the students settle in, or even play recordings of a bird whistle. These methods all reach each aspect of MI. Similar performances can be applied when it is time to transition to a different part of the day or want to communicate class rules. It is not necessary to address all MI’s when developing classroom management, but it helps to. For students with disabilities it can be helpful to name a few popular success stories of others with a disability. Also, creating eight different lesson plans for all intelligences so cratering to a student with disabilities needs. We as teachers should push students to challenge limited beliefs.
Frank Makuch
The chapters indicate the new places that MI theory is being used. In the special education classroom as well as the normal education classroom, students who were struggling were given more of the same type of material to struggle with. The educators were focused on what the students could not do (in a misguided effort to try and help, not humiliate them) instead of focusing on what they could do. Some students may be able to think more effectively in a different intelligence, but not be able to communicate themselves in a non-differentiated classroom. These students are not any dumber than normal students; they just think in a different way and have trouble expressing themselves. With a well differentiated classroom, fewer students may be put into special education classes. Another application of MI theory is in classroom management. Appealing to the eight intelligences can be an effective way of getting students attention.
The chapters mention grading and how to grade. What hasn’t been clear for me has been how to grade all students fairly. It is hard to give a student just one letter grade because there are so many aspects that go in to determining how well a student is doing. Piling all the information together and taking an average may be the easiest way to do it, but it may not be the most helpful to students and parents. What would be more effective was if schools could give different grades based on different things. The two main things I can think of would be progress and grade level achievement. The two parts would give a more accurate reflection of how much work someone is putting in. Also, many teachers will lump formative assessments in with the final course grade. These assessments may not give the whole picture when it comes to understanding of content. If a student did poorly on a quiz, they may get a bad grade, even if they come to understand the material later in the year.
The chapters really make you think about how students and learn and who students are. Special education students are actually no different than normal students. As more and more teachers begin teaching differentiated instruction, fewer and fewer students are being put into special education classes. This suggests that there is really no difference between special education students and “normal” students. Students who do poorly may just be poorly suited to the teachers teaching style. Teachers should make sure to cater to the MI theory so that students do not get left behind academically. The students that do poorly in a poorly differentiated class may be as bright as the students who do well. The difference may lie in the fact that he is not being taught in a way that will help him to be more receptive. We should be teaching in a way that makes it the easiest for our students to learn. We can do this through the MI theory.
Kiera Timme
While these chapters did differ in terms of content, one theme did stand out – balance. Teachers need to find a way to balance many aspects of their diverse classrooms. In particular, teacher must balance the requirement to assign students with a standardized grade, while still remaining true to the UbD and DI models which favor a more holistic approach. The authors suggested solution to this disequilibrium is through the use of a “multipart” (Tomlinson & McTighe, p134) grading system based on student achievement against the desired learning outcomes and standards, a grade reflecting personal progress, and comprehensive reporting system that takes into account student work habits. A balance must also be struck between the teacher’s classroom expectations and the MI’s of his or her students. Teachers must determine the right combination of classroom management practices in order to achieve their desired results, whether this be student attention, smooth transitioning from one activity to another, explanation of class rules, or dealing with individual behaviors. MI theory recommends a multi-faceted approach that reflects all eight MI’s. For example: if an individual student, whose most present intelligence is Bodily-Kinesthetic, is acting aggressively, the teacher could “role-play aggressive behavior and try out alternatives” (Armstrong, p118). Teachers must also take a balanced approach when working with students with disabilities. Too often the scales are shifted and the focus is put on the disabilities of the student, instead of the abilities of the student. We are reminded that, more often than not, the list of things a student with a disability cannot do is far shorter than the list of things they can do. MI theory provides teachers with a great way to find an alternate path, directed at student abilities, through their intelligences not impacted by their disability. Finally, educators must strike a balance between what we want students to learn, and how we present the information. MI theory argues that not only are the eight facets intelligences, they are also memories. If we want students to do more than memorize, we must support and develop their cognitive abilities by aligning the content with the students multiple intelligences.
Creating balance is not an easy task; luckily, the four chapters provide multiple useful examples on how to achieve this balance in each area. I was really intrigued by the idea that effective grading should look like a “photo album” (Tomlinson & McTighe, p135) rather than a single “snapshot.” I have definitely had experiences where much of my final grade hinged on a single test. Simply knowing that this was a high-stakes test affected my performance. These test, particularly in math, failed to take into account my personal progress or my math anxiety. The UbD authors suggestions are great, but sadly require huge grading and reporting reform before they could be implemented. I for one would support such a change. Armstrong’s comments about MI theory and its positive implications for meeting the needs of students with disabilities were extremely helpful. After taking SED101, I became much better acquainted with the role of special education and the part I will play as a teacher. The beauty of MI theory, in regards to special education, is that “the best learning activities for special needs students are those that are most successful with all students” (Armstrong, p154).
Tori Penney
One of the hardest things to do is to get your students engaged and then keep them engaged. But in order to do that, you need to get their attention. Yelling at students is not the way, and no one way will register well with all students. There are many ways to get their attention, and at least one for each different MI. Transitions also have many options, as well as how to communicate class rules. Class rules are very important, because as was stated in the beginning of chapter 8, “a classroom is a microsociety,” and societies need rules or laws to keep order and to make sure everyone is safe. You can’t just make a list of rules and expect that to stick in to everyone’s mind. It just doesn’t work that way. Students need the rules to be presented in many different ways that way it appeals to each intelligence and registers with that student. They will not care that much about the rules if you don’t let them know you care about making sure they are for them and that they understand them.
MI’s also are very helpful for students with special needs. Students in special education are always seen as their disability, and not was what their strengths are. With MI we can focus on their strengths and empower them to grow rather than scaring them into a corner, which we do too often. The growth paradigm avoids doing exactly that, and instead empowers the students through many different ways.
As teachers it is important that we understand this: “how students think has become almost more important than what they think about.” MI theory helps explain the how and helps us figure out how each student comes to their thoughts and conclusions, that way we can empower that train of thought and encourage their growth. We can use MI theory in our classrooms to encourage memory, by having the musical person sing it out or the spatial person visualize what they are trying to remember. We can build on problem solving by having linguistic students think out loud or the interpersonal people build their thoughts off of that of others. There are many other ways to do this, and it is very important that we use these methods in our classrooms. Simple repetition does not work for all students. I remember in middle school my English teacher claimed that it took repeating a fact 26 times for it to become long-term memory. And that never worked for me. But I can sing a song that I found online about the layers of the earth to this day and remember all of them.
Garrett Hodgkins
The over-arching theme of this grouping of chapters was that MI theory can generally apply everywhere in life. It can apply to assessments, it can apply to careers after school, it can apply to classroom management and discipline, and it can certainly apply to teaching students with special needs. All of these areas can benefit when MI theory is applied to them, as workers and students both work better under conditions that apply to their specific areas of intelligence.
For instance, a few of the chapters dealt with how to assess students differently. Differently seems to be the main key word in all of the chapters and articles we read. It talks about doing away with the standardized testing format that only appeals to linguists and logical learners, and finding more differentiated ways to test our students, tests that can cater to their way of understanding things. How can you accurately test a student if not only were you not teaching them in a way that they understood things, but weren’t testing them in that way either? Or even if you were teaching them in an MI way, it would almost be a waste to not grade them in the same format.
When speaking of discipline and classroom management the chapters gave much advice on how appealing to different intelligences could help to keep students behaving and paying attention to the lesson, in turn limiting class disruptions. First of all, in preventive measure, sometimes a student becomes disruptive because s/he is not engaged by the teaching methods, so engage them! Furthermore, it could be emotional, behavioral, or other outside classroom factors that have set the student on edge. Often, trying to reach them and telling them that what they are doing is disruptive in a way that appeals to their intelligence is more beneficial, and generally more effective in getting them to calm down. These include bodily-kinesthetic methods such as breathing exercises, calming music for music, calming oneself down by speaking for verbal, and a number of other examples.
When speaking of students who have disabilites, MI theory stresses the point to look at the students ONLY as individuals and what they can do, not what they cannot do. If a student with disabilities is taught with lessons that cater to their stronger intelligences it will be a more beneficial lesson to him just as it would be with a student who didn’t share similar disabilities. Every student has the capacity to learn, every student.
In my future classroom I want to apply everything I learned in these chapters. I want to make sure that all of my students are assessed just like how they were taught, in a way that caters to their own strengths. I want to make sure all of my students are viewed as equals, are taught as equals, assessed as equals, and certainly grades as equals. Every student deserves a chance to be taught and get graded in a way that suits their intelligence, and to not do just that would be doing a “disservice” to them as MI says.
Tess Perry
Two themes can be drawn from these four chapters. The first is treating students equally on an individual level. All students have different learning styles, by accepting and understanding this teachers must use strategies that appeal to all styles. Because all students learn and process at different rates grades should reflect end of the unit knowledge, not what they may or may not have known before teaching them. If a teacher used the same classroom management techniques at all times students who do not respond well to those techniques may be viewed as a disruptive student. Different classroom management strategies incorporating all the MIs would be more effective, different students would respond differently to each technique. If instruction methods include MI theory special education students may benefit. Some special education students have inclinations towards certain MIs if teachers are involving different MIs special education students would have opportunities to use their strengths. The second theme of the readings can be summarized by the topic of chapter 12 of the MI book: MI theory and cognitive skills. Students who are more developed in a particular MI tend to think in a process similar to that intelligence. This chapter provided examples for each MI of how students remember information and what types of problem solving strategies they use. This knowledge as a teacher should be kept in the forefront when planning grading methods, classroom management strategies and in activities that include special education students.
The six principles for successful grading I found helpful. I thought the principles reflected the values of backward design; a teacher should determine what they want the students to know at the end of a unit, if a student masters that knowledge and skill they should receive a high score for the class. Grading extraneous busy work that does not reflect progress or mastery is a waste of time for the student and teacher. The examples provided for classroom management using the MI theory brought me a new perspective on classroom management. I had not considered how different techniques would work better for some and not others simply because of MI. No longer will I think of students as ‘disruptive’ or ‘well-behaved’ I will just need to find other methods for managing behavior that better suits all students. The message I received from the discussion of special education and MI theory is that teachers should include all students, special education or regular education in a variety of activities. The theory of MI promotes accepting differences and celebrating diversity, what better way to do this than to enhance lessons so all students have the opportunity to learn in ways best for them as individuals!
Jon Delorme
Chapter Eight of Understanding by Design is about how to strike the balance between evaluator of student work and being a supportive advisor. To be balanced teachers must use valid assessments. Valid assessments determine what we intend them to do and not any other outside factors. Grades should not be based off of other students’ grade such as a grading curve, and not everything should be included in grades. I personally believe that homework should either be a very insignificant part of the final grade or nothing at all. Participation will be a big part in my class and attempts at homework will fall under this category. Teacher that graded homework was something I did not like about high school and I think it is unfair to give a grade to something that is supposed to be practice. The book suggests that class participation be kept separate from the overall class grade, which I disagree with. I think participation shows a student who is active in their learning and can help boost a students’ grade that tries hard but still has trouble with the material.
Another role of the teacher is that of classroom manager. There are many bad ways to try and get a hold of students’ attention. Chapter 8 of Multiple Intelligences suggests only as fraction of the types of “hooks” a teacher can do that appeal to different intelligences. I think that having an effective hook to start class would be a great way to prepare my future students to learn. I feel like that if I do the hooks effectively for the first month or so then students would just come to school expecting to learn and I may end up not needing a hook every class. Appealing to multiple intelligences can also help managing behaviors and communicating class rules.
Multiple Intelligence theory is very useful in helping special needs students succeed in the classroom. MI theory can help highlight what a student can do instead of what they can’t do. They can be used in IEPs, which would help teachers understand where the strengths of their special needs students are. This would make inclusion classrooms that much more fluid and help change the culture of America. MI theory can even help in retaining information. A teacher that can identify how their students’ memory works can appeal to that child’s intelligence. Too often do we only try to memorize things in a linguistically or logically. MI theory tells us how kids learn, which is a very powerful tool.
Kaitlyn Bowie
The focus of chapter eight in Understanding by Design is on grading and reporting in a manner that is as differentiated as the actual curriculum. The point of grading is to give students and their parents the right kind of feedback that will aid them in bettering themselves as learners. The chapter breaks down the essential principles of differentiated grading into six parts:
1: Grades and reports should be based on clearly specified learning goals and performance standards.
2: Evidence used for good grading should be valid.
3: Grading should be based on established criteria, not arbitrary norms.
4: Not everything should be included in grades.
5: Avoid grading based on averages.
6: Focus on achievement, and report other factors separately.
I find these standards to be easy to understand, and fairly easy to integrate into an already differentiated curriculum. I was a little uneasy when the criteria said that habits of work should not be graded along with their work, as I feel it is an important aspect of a student’s learning. However, grading separately for habits of work seems quite reasonable, and I think it will help parents understand where their child is straying in terms of grades.
The focus of chapter eight in Multiple Intelligences is on classroom management and discipline while still utilizing the theory of multiple intelligences. MI theory helps to offer a series of alternative perspectives for teachers in dealing with a wide array of students. Student’s minds do not always immediately recognize a teacher’s voice in the din of a classroom, so shouting over them often proves ineffective. I could easily see myself using the linguistic method of writing on the board, asking for silence, or even the musical method of clapping a beat and waiting for a reply from students. Even just by having students help to establish the class norms and rules, I would be exercising the multiple intelligence theory because I would be taking in the opinion s and thoughts of various intelligence types.
Chapter eleven focuses on the use of the multiple intelligence theory in special education. By using the MI theory, teachers can looks at a person with special needs, not in terms of their weakness, but in terms of their strengths. A student who has a reading disability might benefit from an audio book or reading buddy who is willing to read aloud to them and discuss the text with. By finding alternative strengths for special needs students, we can negate the need for alternative classrooms and “special” classes. I would certainly like to integrate this into my classroom, because it would create a great level of equality among my students. No one is smarter, or dumber; we all simply have different strengths in different areas of knowledge.
Chapter twelve focuses on the use of MI theory in encouraging cognitive skills in students. Students are always being told what to think, and they can even think for themselves, but they lack instruction on true deep thinking, often because they are being asked to think deeply in a manner their mind is not conducive to. A student who cannot memorize through simply writing out a word ten times does not necessarily have a bad memory, they are just using the wrong intelligence strategy. Deep thinking is an integral part of Language Arts and English; so encouraging that kind of thinking in my classroom is essential. I can best encourage deep thinking and optimize cognitive processes by encouraging each student to address their work in the most effective intelligence for them.
Caroline Murphy
Chapters 8, 11, and 12 of Multiple Intelligences and Chapter 8 of Understanding by Design focus on taking multiple intelligence theory and differentiated instruction beyond just lesson plans. A lot of emphasis is placed on using the multiple intelligences as forms of new and more effective communication. UbD says that grading – report cards, project scoring, other forms of assessment – must be about communicating constructive feedback to students and parents, as opposed to assigning an arbitrary and competitive number to a student’s work. Grading must be specific, evidence-based, and focus on positive reinforcement. Emphasis is also placed on grades reflecting students’ work habits and progress towards achievement, which connects to what multiple intelligence theory has to say about assessment measuring all different kinds of success. MI theory can also extend to classroom management as well, which connects back to ideas about communication. The book says that good classroom management is about finding ways to relate to each student’s individual intelligence strengths and understand how to best translate what is going on in their heads to what is happening in the classroom. The use of multiple intelligences can also help teachers better communicate with students with special needs. Armstrong says that an appreciation of different intelligence strengths can be a gateway to more acceptance of students with disabilities in an inclusive classroom. Finally, MI theory can also be used to help teachers better understand the cognitive processes of their students and to encourage deep, introspective thinking that breaks free of traditional educational boundaries and embraces the different intelligences.
Something that I believe very strongly in is teachers no longer viewing their students with disabilities as obstacles to their teacher strategies. We need to learn to be welcoming of the different perspectives and learning styles that all students bring to the table, including and most especially students who have been categorized as having a disability. Embracing multiple intelligence theory goes hand-in-hand with accepting the diversity that students with disabilities bring into the classroom, and I think that kind of interchangeability is a huge step in the right direction for education. The books had a lot to say about how to incorporate multiple intelligence acceptance in grading, which is something that I will need to think a lot about when I am teaching. It makes a lot of sense that we should be assessing students with the same differentiated methods that we use to teach them, but I understand why that is hard for teachers to do. Assessments have always been logical and numerical, and those traditional methods can be comforting to teachers when they are in the midst of working experimental methods into their curriculum. And as far as grading goes, a lot of that is left up to the discretion of people higher up the teaching hierarchy, so teachers may feel helpless to affect change to go along with their differentiated instruction. All of these challenges just mean that I will have to work even harder as a teacher, and I will try really hard to find ways to embrace the different multiple intelligences in all aspects of my classroom.
Alison Hutchins
These chapters, on the whole, talk a lot about you can be sure that making sure that your multiple intelligence friendly, differentiated classroom is fair for all students; that the multiple intelligences can be used to practically everything you could need help with in the classroom. The eighth chapter of UBD talks heavily about grading students, and how to best do it in the differentiated classroom. The chapter urges that you really should not grade students on pre- or formative assessments, rather just checking them for completion. The problem with grading these in the differentiated classroom is that all students learn at different speeds, and grading them all the same way is not going to make for student success. It's much better at the these early points to look for progress instead of mastery. It also talked about, just as students learn differently, they also tests differently, and giving them options for assessment can hugely effect their success in exhibiting their understanding. The MI chapters covered a range of multiple intelligence related topics. Chapter eight talked quite a lot about using the multiple intelligences to get the attention of your students. This is something that I had never really considered to be a possibility, but it totally makes sense. A student's multiple intelligence strengths tend to correspond with their interests, so of course using them to keep a class interested would be a great tactic. This is really helpful, because I do worry that I wil not be able to get and keep the attention of my class. An area also covered was how the multiple intelligences can be used in special education, the chapter provides examples for each of the multiple intelligences. These activities are at their roots, however, the same as what you would use in any classroom, as the chapter so eloquently says, "the best learning activities for special needs students are those that are most successful with all students” (p154). The book goes on into the next chapter to talk about how student's internalize information based on their multiple intelligence strengths, this can involve making up little songs or rhymes for some students, or for some others maybe visualizing the information, or repeating it aloud.
I love how these chapters make it clear that grades are just a snapshot of student ability, especially when you're grading tests, any number of factors could play into a students performance. A good student on a bad day could fail, and understanding that and being flexible enough to help remedy that is really important. I also really enjoyed that they talked even more in depth than it has before about how to use the multiple intelligence theory as a tool in your classroom. The idea of using them to get and keep the attention of students, and to keep them on task better, is something that I hadn't thought about, but I love the idea. It kind of reminds me of the MEL structure that we're learning about with Dr. Theresa, two of the important components are connections and context, which would be really important when using the MIs as a way to get and keep student attention. Basically, I know I'm not alone in just wanting to have a classroom where students feel like they can always succeed, no matter how daunting a task may seem, and the information in these chapters was really helpful as it gave further ways to create this kind of environment.
Molly Olsen
MI Theory as used in special education shares many of the same perspectives of "best practice" rules for general education. The idea of focusing on what one does best and cultivating it, instead of concentrating on a struggle, has been a philosophy of special education departments for years, who even have developed an almost new vocabulary to be more encouraging with their students. Something to realize about these special needs students is that while it's true they have different needs from some of their peers, this doesn't mean that they don't still possess many of those same eight intelligences we've been reading about. In fact, a list of high-achieving people facing personal challenges includes Edgar Allen Poe, Agatha Christie, Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Thomas Edison, Ludwig van Beethoven and many others. If they had been put into an environment that didn't encourage their special talents, they may never have cultivated them. Yet, it seems like in many classrooms we DON'T cultivate all of these proclivities and talents because we're so focused on teaching "to the test" and such. This statement is even more true when it comes to special education, if we don't allow these students to try new experiences and let them do things things that interest them, we are doing them a great disservice. What if Agatha Christie had been in a classroom where she was never allowed to write freely because her teachers or parents didn't think her learning disability would allow it? Think of the great British novels we wouldn't have.
Teachers can be discouraging to students in other ways as well, including their style of grading. It's suggested that perhaps we as teachers shouldn't be grading students on so many things, and putting it behind one letter. Teachers will normally take into consideration grades on tests and homework, behavior, amount of improvement, etc. and squash all of that information into one grade. So really, a student could be doing perfectly on his tests and papers, but because he hasn't "improved" or simply doesn't have a great attitude, his entire grade for the class suffers. The argument is that these things are not truly cumulative, and are so different that putting them together doesn't make much sense. The suggestion stands that perhaps separate grades for separate things would be more appropriate. Yes, it's important for students to have a good work ethic, but is that one the same level as how highly they score on a test? In my opinion, I believe in the "one score fits all" theory, but this is probably because I was always that kid who could get by if they at least showed they were trying. I once wrote a song about radian circles on my ukulele for class and got 3 extra points on my final grade, because the teacher saw I was trying so hard to understand, and that I was putting time into this class. I put a very high value on trying, and while I will never put it as high as the actual academic grade earned, it will always be a consideration.
Table of Contents
Abstract
This grouping of chapters dealt largely with how MI and differentiation can be used in other ways besides the lesson plan in the classroom as well as how to deal with students as individuals. MI is important to apply to every facet of the classroom. It can be used to get the classroom under control, to understand why students are acting out, as well as assessing and grading students. Tess said in her abstract “ Different classroom management strategies incorporating all the MI’s would be more effective, different students would respond differently to each technique.” Basically, in order to manage your classroom in the most efficient and effective manner you have to use strategies that appeal to all students equally. For instance, a musical cue to calm students down, or simply writing on the board. Furthermore, the books talk about how using MI in Spec. Education classrooms could be greatly useful. All students learn in different ways and can benefit from being taught in a way that caters to them, ALL students. Also, the book suggests that when grading individual students to focus more on summative assessments not formative assessments. Allison hit the nail on the head “The problem with grading these in the differentiated classroom is that all students learn at different speeds, and grading them all the same way is not going to make for student success. It's much better at the these early points to look for progress instead of mastery.” The important thing in the classroom, the book stresses, is to look for progress among students rather than complete understanding of the subject early on.Synthesis
Unsurprisingly, one commonality was present among all of our comments – grading. We all had strong opinions about the grading policies and practices mentioned in these four chapters. Although we all recognized the need for a differentiated classroom to have a grading system that reflected student achievement in a fuller way, we had different ideas on what that might look like. Most agreed that individual progress and effort should be acknowledged alongside the grade that indicated the student’s level of mastery. However, some preferred a single grade that encompassed all of these elements, as opposed to separate grades for each criterion.Another prominent theme related to the benefits of MI theory when working with students with disabilities. Most of us saw MI theory as a great way to create truly inclusive classrooms. MI theory is an educational philosophy centered on utilizing student strengths, focusing on abilities, rather than deficits, as a means to engage, teach and assess students. It seemed to all of us, that MI theory is an ideal lens with which to view, and support, all students, including those students with disabilities.
MI theory also had implications for classroom management. The suggestions provided in the chapter really caught our collective eye, and provided us with useful tips on how to create desired behaviors and to manage transitions. In particular, several people commented on the preventative and reactive measures, such as the use of MI related hooks, communication of the classroom expectations, and attention grabbing instructional strategies.
Sean Falasca
Grading can be assigning symbolic letters or numbers at the end of a specified time to evaluate a student’s performance, or reporting evaluations to students and parents. The important part about grading is to give high quality feedback to the importance audiences like students, parents, or guardians. A grade should represent proficiency related to important goals. This is why goals and standards should be made very clearly to students so that they can receive a proper evaluation of their understandings. Grades should not be influenced by outside factors like putting names on their paper or the quality of their penmanship because neither of those shows mastery or understanding. The worst student in the world can put their name on their paper and write excellently, but that won’t help them in the real world that much. A grade should represent that students full capabilities. Don’t limit them based off solely one or two pieces of criteria. There are students who can be misplaced in a class full of high performers when they are a low performer or vice versa. Normal letter grading tends to promote an unhealthy competition and discourage those with low grades. People in my high school actually made cliques out of who got what type of grades. The sort of “winners” and “losers” of the school based off grades is not acceptable. It’s not fair because there are students who have lower grades just because they are bored, aren’t being challenged enough, or not being taught the right way. Working out of a J Curve where all students have the same opportunity to earn high grades based on achievement of clearly stated goals. Grades should be established based on summative assessment that is properly designed to allow students gathered proficiency related to identify goals. One of the worst things in school is when teachers have different opinions about grading. You have to memorize each teacher’s preferences on what constitutes a good grade. For all teachers to make it easier on students understanding of how to succeed, they should uniformly apply the asp
ect of grading. Grade students for achievement of goals, progress toward goals, and work habits.
Managing a class when using MI can be approached a variety of ways. To gain attention you can write silence please on the whiteboard, clap a short rhythmic phrase, put your fingers against your lips, provide a picture of what an attentive class looks like, use a stopwatch to keep track of time wasted, whisper to a students that its time to start and pass it along, simply start teaching and let the students settle in, or even play recordings of a bird whistle. These methods all reach each aspect of MI. Similar performances can be applied when it is time to transition to a different part of the day or want to communicate class rules. It is not necessary to address all MI’s when developing classroom management, but it helps to. For students with disabilities it can be helpful to name a few popular success stories of others with a disability. Also, creating eight different lesson plans for all intelligences so cratering to a student with disabilities needs. We as teachers should push students to challenge limited beliefs.
Frank Makuch
The chapters indicate the new places that MI theory is being used. In the special education classroom as well as the normal education classroom, students who were struggling were given more of the same type of material to struggle with. The educators were focused on what the students could not do (in a misguided effort to try and help, not humiliate them) instead of focusing on what they could do. Some students may be able to think more effectively in a different intelligence, but not be able to communicate themselves in a non-differentiated classroom. These students are not any dumber than normal students; they just think in a different way and have trouble expressing themselves. With a well differentiated classroom, fewer students may be put into special education classes. Another application of MI theory is in classroom management. Appealing to the eight intelligences can be an effective way of getting students attention.The chapters mention grading and how to grade. What hasn’t been clear for me has been how to grade all students fairly. It is hard to give a student just one letter grade because there are so many aspects that go in to determining how well a student is doing. Piling all the information together and taking an average may be the easiest way to do it, but it may not be the most helpful to students and parents. What would be more effective was if schools could give different grades based on different things. The two main things I can think of would be progress and grade level achievement. The two parts would give a more accurate reflection of how much work someone is putting in. Also, many teachers will lump formative assessments in with the final course grade. These assessments may not give the whole picture when it comes to understanding of content. If a student did poorly on a quiz, they may get a bad grade, even if they come to understand the material later in the year.
The chapters really make you think about how students and learn and who students are. Special education students are actually no different than normal students. As more and more teachers begin teaching differentiated instruction, fewer and fewer students are being put into special education classes. This suggests that there is really no difference between special education students and “normal” students. Students who do poorly may just be poorly suited to the teachers teaching style. Teachers should make sure to cater to the MI theory so that students do not get left behind academically. The students that do poorly in a poorly differentiated class may be as bright as the students who do well. The difference may lie in the fact that he is not being taught in a way that will help him to be more receptive. We should be teaching in a way that makes it the easiest for our students to learn. We can do this through the MI theory.
Kiera Timme
While these chapters did differ in terms of content, one theme did stand out – balance. Teachers need to find a way to balance many aspects of their diverse classrooms. In particular, teacher must balance the requirement to assign students with a standardized grade, while still remaining true to the UbD and DI models which favor a more holistic approach. The authors suggested solution to this disequilibrium is through the use of a “multipart” (Tomlinson & McTighe, p134) grading system based on student achievement against the desired learning outcomes and standards, a grade reflecting personal progress, and comprehensive reporting system that takes into account student work habits. A balance must also be struck between the teacher’s classroom expectations and the MI’s of his or her students. Teachers must determine the right combination of classroom management practices in order to achieve their desired results, whether this be student attention, smooth transitioning from one activity to another, explanation of class rules, or dealing with individual behaviors. MI theory recommends a multi-faceted approach that reflects all eight MI’s. For example: if an individual student, whose most present intelligence is Bodily-Kinesthetic, is acting aggressively, the teacher could “role-play aggressive behavior and try out alternatives” (Armstrong, p118). Teachers must also take a balanced approach when working with students with disabilities. Too often the scales are shifted and the focus is put on the disabilities of the student, instead of the abilities of the student. We are reminded that, more often than not, the list of things a student with a disability cannot do is far shorter than the list of things they can do. MI theory provides teachers with a great way to find an alternate path, directed at student abilities, through their intelligences not impacted by their disability. Finally, educators must strike a balance between what we want students to learn, and how we present the information. MI theory argues that not only are the eight facets intelligences, they are also memories. If we want students to do more than memorize, we must support and develop their cognitive abilities by aligning the content with the students multiple intelligences.Creating balance is not an easy task; luckily, the four chapters provide multiple useful examples on how to achieve this balance in each area. I was really intrigued by the idea that effective grading should look like a “photo album” (Tomlinson & McTighe, p135) rather than a single “snapshot.” I have definitely had experiences where much of my final grade hinged on a single test. Simply knowing that this was a high-stakes test affected my performance. These test, particularly in math, failed to take into account my personal progress or my math anxiety. The UbD authors suggestions are great, but sadly require huge grading and reporting reform before they could be implemented. I for one would support such a change. Armstrong’s comments about MI theory and its positive implications for meeting the needs of students with disabilities were extremely helpful. After taking SED101, I became much better acquainted with the role of special education and the part I will play as a teacher. The beauty of MI theory, in regards to special education, is that “the best learning activities for special needs students are those that are most successful with all students” (Armstrong, p154).
Tori Penney
One of the hardest things to do is to get your students engaged and then keep them engaged. But in order to do that, you need to get their attention. Yelling at students is not the way, and no one way will register well with all students. There are many ways to get their attention, and at least one for each different MI. Transitions also have many options, as well as how to communicate class rules. Class rules are very important, because as was stated in the beginning of chapter 8, “a classroom is a microsociety,” and societies need rules or laws to keep order and to make sure everyone is safe. You can’t just make a list of rules and expect that to stick in to everyone’s mind. It just doesn’t work that way. Students need the rules to be presented in many different ways that way it appeals to each intelligence and registers with that student. They will not care that much about the rules if you don’t let them know you care about making sure they are for them and that they understand them.MI’s also are very helpful for students with special needs. Students in special education are always seen as their disability, and not was what their strengths are. With MI we can focus on their strengths and empower them to grow rather than scaring them into a corner, which we do too often. The growth paradigm avoids doing exactly that, and instead empowers the students through many different ways.
As teachers it is important that we understand this: “how students think has become almost more important than what they think about.” MI theory helps explain the how and helps us figure out how each student comes to their thoughts and conclusions, that way we can empower that train of thought and encourage their growth. We can use MI theory in our classrooms to encourage memory, by having the musical person sing it out or the spatial person visualize what they are trying to remember. We can build on problem solving by having linguistic students think out loud or the interpersonal people build their thoughts off of that of others. There are many other ways to do this, and it is very important that we use these methods in our classrooms. Simple repetition does not work for all students. I remember in middle school my English teacher claimed that it took repeating a fact 26 times for it to become long-term memory. And that never worked for me. But I can sing a song that I found online about the layers of the earth to this day and remember all of them.
Garrett Hodgkins
The over-arching theme of this grouping of chapters was that MI theory can generally apply everywhere in life. It can apply to assessments, it can apply to careers after school, it can apply to classroom management and discipline, and it can certainly apply to teaching students with special needs. All of these areas can benefit when MI theory is applied to them, as workers and students both work better under conditions that apply to their specific areas of intelligence.For instance, a few of the chapters dealt with how to assess students differently. Differently seems to be the main key word in all of the chapters and articles we read. It talks about doing away with the standardized testing format that only appeals to linguists and logical learners, and finding more differentiated ways to test our students, tests that can cater to their way of understanding things. How can you accurately test a student if not only were you not teaching them in a way that they understood things, but weren’t testing them in that way either? Or even if you were teaching them in an MI way, it would almost be a waste to not grade them in the same format.
When speaking of discipline and classroom management the chapters gave much advice on how appealing to different intelligences could help to keep students behaving and paying attention to the lesson, in turn limiting class disruptions. First of all, in preventive measure, sometimes a student becomes disruptive because s/he is not engaged by the teaching methods, so engage them! Furthermore, it could be emotional, behavioral, or other outside classroom factors that have set the student on edge. Often, trying to reach them and telling them that what they are doing is disruptive in a way that appeals to their intelligence is more beneficial, and generally more effective in getting them to calm down. These include bodily-kinesthetic methods such as breathing exercises, calming music for music, calming oneself down by speaking for verbal, and a number of other examples.
When speaking of students who have disabilites, MI theory stresses the point to look at the students ONLY as individuals and what they can do, not what they cannot do. If a student with disabilities is taught with lessons that cater to their stronger intelligences it will be a more beneficial lesson to him just as it would be with a student who didn’t share similar disabilities. Every student has the capacity to learn, every student.
In my future classroom I want to apply everything I learned in these chapters. I want to make sure that all of my students are assessed just like how they were taught, in a way that caters to their own strengths. I want to make sure all of my students are viewed as equals, are taught as equals, assessed as equals, and certainly grades as equals. Every student deserves a chance to be taught and get graded in a way that suits their intelligence, and to not do just that would be doing a “disservice” to them as MI says.
Tess Perry
Two themes can be drawn from these four chapters. The first is treating students equally on an individual level. All students have different learning styles, by accepting and understanding this teachers must use strategies that appeal to all styles. Because all students learn and process at different rates grades should reflect end of the unit knowledge, not what they may or may not have known before teaching them. If a teacher used the same classroom management techniques at all times students who do not respond well to those techniques may be viewed as a disruptive student. Different classroom management strategies incorporating all the MIs would be more effective, different students would respond differently to each technique. If instruction methods include MI theory special education students may benefit. Some special education students have inclinations towards certain MIs if teachers are involving different MIs special education students would have opportunities to use their strengths. The second theme of the readings can be summarized by the topic of chapter 12 of the MI book: MI theory and cognitive skills. Students who are more developed in a particular MI tend to think in a process similar to that intelligence. This chapter provided examples for each MI of how students remember information and what types of problem solving strategies they use. This knowledge as a teacher should be kept in the forefront when planning grading methods, classroom management strategies and in activities that include special education students.
The six principles for successful grading I found helpful. I thought the principles reflected the values of backward design; a teacher should determine what they want the students to know at the end of a unit, if a student masters that knowledge and skill they should receive a high score for the class. Grading extraneous busy work that does not reflect progress or mastery is a waste of time for the student and teacher. The examples provided for classroom management using the MI theory brought me a new perspective on classroom management. I had not considered how different techniques would work better for some and not others simply because of MI. No longer will I think of students as ‘disruptive’ or ‘well-behaved’ I will just need to find other methods for managing behavior that better suits all students. The message I received from the discussion of special education and MI theory is that teachers should include all students, special education or regular education in a variety of activities. The theory of MI promotes accepting differences and celebrating diversity, what better way to do this than to enhance lessons so all students have the opportunity to learn in ways best for them as individuals!
Jon Delorme
Chapter Eight of Understanding by Design is about how to strike the balance between evaluator of student work and being a supportive advisor. To be balanced teachers must use valid assessments. Valid assessments determine what we intend them to do and not any other outside factors. Grades should not be based off of other students’ grade such as a grading curve, and not everything should be included in grades. I personally believe that homework should either be a very insignificant part of the final grade or nothing at all. Participation will be a big part in my class and attempts at homework will fall under this category. Teacher that graded homework was something I did not like about high school and I think it is unfair to give a grade to something that is supposed to be practice. The book suggests that class participation be kept separate from the overall class grade, which I disagree with. I think participation shows a student who is active in their learning and can help boost a students’ grade that tries hard but still has trouble with the material.
Another role of the teacher is that of classroom manager. There are many bad ways to try and get a hold of students’ attention. Chapter 8 of Multiple Intelligences suggests only as fraction of the types of “hooks” a teacher can do that appeal to different intelligences. I think that having an effective hook to start class would be a great way to prepare my future students to learn. I feel like that if I do the hooks effectively for the first month or so then students would just come to school expecting to learn and I may end up not needing a hook every class. Appealing to multiple intelligences can also help managing behaviors and communicating class rules.
Multiple Intelligence theory is very useful in helping special needs students succeed in the classroom. MI theory can help highlight what a student can do instead of what they can’t do. They can be used in IEPs, which would help teachers understand where the strengths of their special needs students are. This would make inclusion classrooms that much more fluid and help change the culture of America. MI theory can even help in retaining information. A teacher that can identify how their students’ memory works can appeal to that child’s intelligence. Too often do we only try to memorize things in a linguistically or logically. MI theory tells us how kids learn, which is a very powerful tool.
Kaitlyn Bowie
The focus of chapter eight in Understanding by Design is on grading and reporting in a manner that is as differentiated as the actual curriculum. The point of grading is to give students and their parents the right kind of feedback that will aid them in bettering themselves as learners. The chapter breaks down the essential principles of differentiated grading into six parts:1: Grades and reports should be based on clearly specified learning goals and performance standards.
2: Evidence used for good grading should be valid.
3: Grading should be based on established criteria, not arbitrary norms.
4: Not everything should be included in grades.
5: Avoid grading based on averages.
6: Focus on achievement, and report other factors separately.
I find these standards to be easy to understand, and fairly easy to integrate into an already differentiated curriculum. I was a little uneasy when the criteria said that habits of work should not be graded along with their work, as I feel it is an important aspect of a student’s learning. However, grading separately for habits of work seems quite reasonable, and I think it will help parents understand where their child is straying in terms of grades.
The focus of chapter eight in Multiple Intelligences is on classroom management and discipline while still utilizing the theory of multiple intelligences. MI theory helps to offer a series of alternative perspectives for teachers in dealing with a wide array of students. Student’s minds do not always immediately recognize a teacher’s voice in the din of a classroom, so shouting over them often proves ineffective. I could easily see myself using the linguistic method of writing on the board, asking for silence, or even the musical method of clapping a beat and waiting for a reply from students. Even just by having students help to establish the class norms and rules, I would be exercising the multiple intelligence theory because I would be taking in the opinion s and thoughts of various intelligence types.
Chapter eleven focuses on the use of the multiple intelligence theory in special education. By using the MI theory, teachers can looks at a person with special needs, not in terms of their weakness, but in terms of their strengths. A student who has a reading disability might benefit from an audio book or reading buddy who is willing to read aloud to them and discuss the text with. By finding alternative strengths for special needs students, we can negate the need for alternative classrooms and “special” classes. I would certainly like to integrate this into my classroom, because it would create a great level of equality among my students. No one is smarter, or dumber; we all simply have different strengths in different areas of knowledge.
Chapter twelve focuses on the use of MI theory in encouraging cognitive skills in students. Students are always being told what to think, and they can even think for themselves, but they lack instruction on true deep thinking, often because they are being asked to think deeply in a manner their mind is not conducive to. A student who cannot memorize through simply writing out a word ten times does not necessarily have a bad memory, they are just using the wrong intelligence strategy. Deep thinking is an integral part of Language Arts and English; so encouraging that kind of thinking in my classroom is essential. I can best encourage deep thinking and optimize cognitive processes by encouraging each student to address their work in the most effective intelligence for them.
Caroline Murphy
Chapters 8, 11, and 12 of Multiple Intelligences and Chapter 8 of Understanding by Design focus on taking multiple intelligence theory and differentiated instruction beyond just lesson plans. A lot of emphasis is placed on using the multiple intelligences as forms of new and more effective communication. UbD says that grading – report cards, project scoring, other forms of assessment – must be about communicating constructive feedback to students and parents, as opposed to assigning an arbitrary and competitive number to a student’s work. Grading must be specific, evidence-based, and focus on positive reinforcement. Emphasis is also placed on grades reflecting students’ work habits and progress towards achievement, which connects to what multiple intelligence theory has to say about assessment measuring all different kinds of success. MI theory can also extend to classroom management as well, which connects back to ideas about communication. The book says that good classroom management is about finding ways to relate to each student’s individual intelligence strengths and understand how to best translate what is going on in their heads to what is happening in the classroom. The use of multiple intelligences can also help teachers better communicate with students with special needs. Armstrong says that an appreciation of different intelligence strengths can be a gateway to more acceptance of students with disabilities in an inclusive classroom. Finally, MI theory can also be used to help teachers better understand the cognitive processes of their students and to encourage deep, introspective thinking that breaks free of traditional educational boundaries and embraces the different intelligences.Something that I believe very strongly in is teachers no longer viewing their students with disabilities as obstacles to their teacher strategies. We need to learn to be welcoming of the different perspectives and learning styles that all students bring to the table, including and most especially students who have been categorized as having a disability. Embracing multiple intelligence theory goes hand-in-hand with accepting the diversity that students with disabilities bring into the classroom, and I think that kind of interchangeability is a huge step in the right direction for education. The books had a lot to say about how to incorporate multiple intelligence acceptance in grading, which is something that I will need to think a lot about when I am teaching. It makes a lot of sense that we should be assessing students with the same differentiated methods that we use to teach them, but I understand why that is hard for teachers to do. Assessments have always been logical and numerical, and those traditional methods can be comforting to teachers when they are in the midst of working experimental methods into their curriculum. And as far as grading goes, a lot of that is left up to the discretion of people higher up the teaching hierarchy, so teachers may feel helpless to affect change to go along with their differentiated instruction. All of these challenges just mean that I will have to work even harder as a teacher, and I will try really hard to find ways to embrace the different multiple intelligences in all aspects of my classroom.
Alison Hutchins
These chapters, on the whole, talk a lot about you can be sure that making sure that your multiple intelligence friendly, differentiated classroom is fair for all students; that the multiple intelligences can be used to practically everything you could need help with in the classroom. The eighth chapter of UBD talks heavily about grading students, and how to best do it in the differentiated classroom. The chapter urges that you really should not grade students on pre- or formative assessments, rather just checking them for completion. The problem with grading these in the differentiated classroom is that all students learn at different speeds, and grading them all the same way is not going to make for student success. It's much better at the these early points to look for progress instead of mastery. It also talked about, just as students learn differently, they also tests differently, and giving them options for assessment can hugely effect their success in exhibiting their understanding. The MI chapters covered a range of multiple intelligence related topics. Chapter eight talked quite a lot about using the multiple intelligences to get the attention of your students. This is something that I had never really considered to be a possibility, but it totally makes sense. A student's multiple intelligence strengths tend to correspond with their interests, so of course using them to keep a class interested would be a great tactic. This is really helpful, because I do worry that I wil not be able to get and keep the attention of my class. An area also covered was how the multiple intelligences can be used in special education, the chapter provides examples for each of the multiple intelligences. These activities are at their roots, however, the same as what you would use in any classroom, as the chapter so eloquently says, "the best learning activities for special needs students are those that are most successful with all students” (p154). The book goes on into the next chapter to talk about how student's internalize information based on their multiple intelligence strengths, this can involve making up little songs or rhymes for some students, or for some others maybe visualizing the information, or repeating it aloud.
I love how these chapters make it clear that grades are just a snapshot of student ability, especially when you're grading tests, any number of factors could play into a students performance. A good student on a bad day could fail, and understanding that and being flexible enough to help remedy that is really important. I also really enjoyed that they talked even more in depth than it has before about how to use the multiple intelligence theory as a tool in your classroom. The idea of using them to get and keep the attention of students, and to keep them on task better, is something that I hadn't thought about, but I love the idea. It kind of reminds me of the MEL structure that we're learning about with Dr. Theresa, two of the important components are connections and context, which would be really important when using the MIs as a way to get and keep student attention. Basically, I know I'm not alone in just wanting to have a classroom where students feel like they can always succeed, no matter how daunting a task may seem, and the information in these chapters was really helpful as it gave further ways to create this kind of environment.
Molly Olsen
MI Theory as used in special education shares many of the same perspectives of "best practice" rules for general education. The idea of focusing on what one does best and cultivating it, instead of concentrating on a struggle, has been a philosophy of special education departments for years, who even have developed an almost new vocabulary to be more encouraging with their students. Something to realize about these special needs students is that while it's true they have different needs from some of their peers, this doesn't mean that they don't still possess many of those same eight intelligences we've been reading about. In fact, a list of high-achieving people facing personal challenges includes Edgar Allen Poe, Agatha Christie, Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Thomas Edison, Ludwig van Beethoven and many others. If they had been put into an environment that didn't encourage their special talents, they may never have cultivated them. Yet, it seems like in many classrooms we DON'T cultivate all of these proclivities and talents because we're so focused on teaching "to the test" and such. This statement is even more true when it comes to special education, if we don't allow these students to try new experiences and let them do things things that interest them, we are doing them a great disservice. What if Agatha Christie had been in a classroom where she was never allowed to write freely because her teachers or parents didn't think her learning disability would allow it? Think of the great British novels we wouldn't have.Teachers can be discouraging to students in other ways as well, including their style of grading. It's suggested that perhaps we as teachers shouldn't be grading students on so many things, and putting it behind one letter. Teachers will normally take into consideration grades on tests and homework, behavior, amount of improvement, etc. and squash all of that information into one grade. So really, a student could be doing perfectly on his tests and papers, but because he hasn't "improved" or simply doesn't have a great attitude, his entire grade for the class suffers. The argument is that these things are not truly cumulative, and are so different that putting them together doesn't make much sense. The suggestion stands that perhaps separate grades for separate things would be more appropriate. Yes, it's important for students to have a good work ethic, but is that one the same level as how highly they score on a test? In my opinion, I believe in the "one score fits all" theory, but this is probably because I was always that kid who could get by if they at least showed they were trying. I once wrote a song about radian circles on my ukulele for class and got 3 extra points on my final grade, because the teacher saw I was trying so hard to understand, and that I was putting time into this class. I put a very high value on trying, and while I will never put it as high as the actual academic grade earned, it will always be a consideration.